6.00pm CEST: Et c'est parti! Welcome to the Guardian's live blog of the second and final round of the French presidential election. Will Socialist Party challenger François Hollande, as expected, come in pole position or will incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy defy the polls and win a second term as president of the Republic? Stay with us here for live updates throughout the evening.

6.07pm CEST: Looks like we've got a strong turnout for today's presidential election, BFMTV is estimating that by 8pm the turnout will stand at 82%.

6.11pm CEST: If you are not a Francophile, or you are coming to today's election a little blind. Here are some background articles:

6.37pm CEST: French electoral rules prevent us from reporting on exit polls before all of the polling booths in France close at 8pm CEST. However, there is some inventive bending of the rules going on on Twitter.

6.41pm CEST: Final comments form the candidates today. Hollande, casting his vote cast his vote this morning in his political heartland, the town of Tulle in central France, reportedly slept little last night.

"It's going to be a long day," he told reporters at the Tulle polling station. "It's up to the French people to decide if it's going to be a good day."

Sarkozy, along with his wife Carla Bruni-Sarkozy , voted in the chic 16th district but declined to speak to reporters.

6.50pm CEST: My colleague Lizzy Davies has been speaking to French voters in Kentish Town in London. There are three polling stations in London and 10 nationwide.

Five years ago, Franco-British export manager Yves Parent cast his vote for the French presidential candidate who promised a "rupture" with the past that would change his home country for the better.

Today, as he stood outside the polling station at the Collège français bilingue in Kentish Town, Parent was adamant that he would not be doing the same thing again. "I'm disappointed by what [Nicolas] Sarkozy's done," he said. "I voted for [Francois] Hollande but not with conviction."

Like many of the expatriates who, armed with takeaway coffees and a fierce sense of republican duty, descended on this usually tranquil corner of north London to vote in presidential run-off on the other side of the Channel, Parent said he felt distinctly uninspired by this year's candidates.

Has the man he voted for got what it takes? "No," said Parent, shrugging. "We had two choices: vote Hollande or do a blank vote. Marine le Pen said we should do a blank vote and I'm not going to do anything she says. So it's more a vote of last resort."

7.01pm CEST: Socialist supporters are already gathering, confident of a victory. Rue de Solferino, where the Socialist HQ is based, is already full of hundreds of supporters, blocking the road.

7.05pm CEST: My colleague Jon Henley has been tickled by this joke, sent to him by his friend Anna McQueen. You'll need a Facebook account to access.

7.12pm CEST: For those who are wondering why we are adhering to French electoral rules (such as PortalooMassacre and Benulek)which prohibit publication of exit polls before the close of the polls at 8pm, the Guardian has received legal advice which states:

The authorities have threatened to prosecute anyone who publishes the exit polls 'in France' indicating that they consider any site accessed from a French IP address to amount to a publication in France. The French courts would consider any website that was accessible in France to be within their jurisdiction.

7.17 CESTpm: Of course, France is not the only country going to the polls today. In the Greek parliamentary election early polls suggest the two main parties have suffered significant losses.

The BBC reports:

The polls put centre-right New Democracy in the lead with 17-20% of the vote, down from 33.5% in 2009.Centre-left Pasok is put in third place with 14-17%, down from 43.9%. Syriza, a left-wing coalition, is put ahead of it in second place with 15.5-18.5%.

Pasok and New Democracy, in coalition since last November, were expected to lose support to anti-austerity parties.

There is widespread anger across Greece to harsh measures imposed by the government in return for international bailouts. Syriza opposes the government's austerity measures.

The neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party could enter parliament for the first time if the exit poll prediction of it winning 6-8% of the vote comes to fruition.Official results are expected later on Sunday night.

7.28pm CEST: With 30 minutes to go before polling stations close, this picture tells its own story. The Place de Bastille full of Socialist supporters, Bruno Waterfield has tweeted that the Place de Concorde - traditional gathering point for the Right - is empty.

7.40pm CEST: My colleague Kim Willsher is at the Socialist Party headquarters in Solferino.

Mood of growing excitement at Solferino. Completely different from the atmosphere two weeks ago when it was quite tense. Huge crowd of people waving flags outside and so many press journalists having to sit on the floor to write their stories. Early predictions have been circulating, even though the official results won't be known until 8pm.

7.43pm CEST: Quarter of an hour before we will have the result of tody's presidential election, French newspaper Le Monde has posted this video of the atmosphere at Solferino.

7.46pm CEST:Writer Fiachra Gibbons, former Guardian arts correspondent, has sent me this dispatch from the Place de Bastille.

Euphoric atmosphere at Bastille — hard to believe that François Hollande, the clubable once chubby Monsieur Flamby, could provoke quite so much fervour, but he has — and we don't even have the official, official results yet. The truth is the thousands of Parisians here have gathered as much to celebrate the demise and humiliation of Nicolas Sarkozy as the triumph of François Hollande.

People are smiling, laughing, being wonderfully joyful and polite — generally not behaving at all like Parisians ought to in public. It must have been like this after the liberation — when Parisians, who usually go to great lengths to ignore and be pointlessly rude to each other, also let their hair down for a few days. A Portuguese gardienne from my quarter who hasn't talked to me once in six years just hugged and kissed me on the mouth when she recognised me in the crowd. Immaculata voted for Le Pen in the first round but against Sarko today. "It is true there are too many foreigners and Muslims in France but his voice was driving me mad. He's a crazy person. And he was making the country as crazy as him. It could not go on. All he cared about was himself and his rich friends."

A shout of "Sarko en prison!" — roughly, "Lock up Sarko" — has been taken up by a part of the crowd, a reference to the multiple corruption and party funding investigations he will now face, from the Karachi scandal over the death of 11 French engineers in Pakistan over alleged unpaid kickbacks to Bettencourt brown envelopes and now allegations of millions from Gaddafi. An even more grisly chant of "Copé au pot eau!" ("Put Copé against the wall [and shoot him]) is also making an occasional appearance, aimed at the not very likable head of Sarko's UMP party — who if you can imagine such a thing, plays the Mr Nasty to Sarko's Mr Nice — and who was responsible for the ban on niqab. But the violence of the slogan seems completely at odds with the mood of the night and is being drowned out by the very drole, "Copé au burqa!" (Put Copé in a burqa!)

Lots of people I have talked to believe France is rid of Sarko forever, that there is no way back for him now. (There are, rather cruelly, not giving his marriage much of a chance of survival either.). They point to his frequent protests that he would withdraw forever from public life if he lost, which I think amounted to "Re-elect me or I will never play with you again".'But I don't think this will be the last we hear of him. Remember he has Transylvanian blood — and as far as I can seetonight, there's been no crucifixes or silver bullets.

7.52pm CEST: My colleague Helena Smith has sent this update on the Greek election results.

Latest exit poll showing New Democracy leading with between 19 to 20.5 of the vote, followed by the radical leftist party, Syriza, with as much as 17 % of the vote and socialist Pasok with between 13 to 14 % of the vote.

7.55pm CEST: France 2 is currently outside Hollande's office. He is preparing his speech, alone apart from his partner Valérie Trierweiler.

François Hollande has won power in France, turning the tide on a rightwards and xenophobic lurch in European politics and vowing to transform Europe's handling of the economic crisis by fighting back against German-led austerity measures.

The 57-year-old rural MP and self-styled Mr Normal, a moderate social-democrat from the centre of the Socialist party, is France's first left-wing president in almost 20 years. Projections from early counts, released by French TV, put his score at 51.90%.

His emphatic victory is a boost to the left in a continent that has gradually swung right since the economic crisis broke four years ago.

Nicolas Sarkozy, defeated after one term in office, became the 11th European leader to be swept from power since the economic crisis in 2008. But the defeat of the most unpopular French president ever to run for re-election was not simply the result of the global financial crisis or eurozone debt turmoil. It was also down to the intense public dislike of the man seen as "President of the Rich" who had swept to victory in 2007 with a huge mandate to change France. The majority of French people felt he had failed to deliver his promises, and he was criticised for his ostentation display of wealth, favouring the rich and leaving behind him over 2.8 million unemployed. Political analysts said anti-Sarkozyism had become a cultural phenomenon in France.

8.38pm CEST: Nicolas Sarkozy has given a very personal, but calm, speech to his supporters following his defeat by François Hollande. He urged them not to jeer or whistle Hollande. Over a vast amount of noise, a rather sad looking Sarkozy said:

"French public has made its choice," he said. Over the boos of his supporters he added: "I ask you to listen to what I have to say. It is a democratic, a republican choice. François Hollande is the president of France and that must be respected."

In his concession speech, Sarkozy told tearful supporters that he was taking sole responsibility for defeat. He had spoken to Hollande on the phone and wished him good luck in a time of "difficult challenges".

He added: "But I wish with all my heart that our country comes together and manages ot overcome these challenges."

Hinting about his possible political future, he said: "My place will no longer be the same. My involvement in the life of my country will now be different."

He previously said he would leave politics if he lost the election. Sarkozy is only the second incumbent president to fail to win re-election since the start of France's Fifth Republic in 1958. Valery Giscard d'Estaing, lost to socialist Francois Mitterrand in 1981.

9.00pm CEST: All all go here tonight. Helena Smith in Athens has been in touch with an exit poll update from the Greek elections.

Latest figures released by Greece's Interior Ministry show the conservative New Democracy leading with 19.2% - way below the 35% needed to have a workable majority- the radical left party Syriza, the election's surprise winner, following with 16.3%, and the socialist Pasok coming in with 13.6%.

The anti-austerity Independent Greeks party, which broke away from New Democracy a mere three months ago, clinched 10.5%, the orthodox KKE party 8.5%, the neo-Nazi Chrysi Avgi 7.0% (catapulting ultra nationalists into parliament for the first time since 1974 and the Democratic Left party 6%. According to the interior ministry Syriza, which has called for the "uimmediate cancellation" of international rescue loans propping uip the debt-stricken Greek economy, lead all parties in the greater Athens region where it was widely supported by the under 50 age group.

Commentators tonight are saying the result marks the end of party politics as Greece has known them since the reintroduction of democracy 38 years ago. The centre left Pasok and conservative New Democracy identified by voters with the mismanagement of the economy were effectively over. "This is an exceptionally painful day for us," Pasok leader's Evangelos Venizelos has just said in a nationalised address.

"The entire political scene has changed. Everything is changing. Greeks don't want anything to remain the same and they have said "no" in the loudest way possible to austerity, this war that our EU partners have waged within our borders," said the popular satirist Lakis Lazopoulos.

9.11pm CEST: And here is a link to Helena's story on our site following today's events in Greece.

Governing parties backing EU-mandated austerity in Greece are on course for a major drubbing as hard-hit voters, venting their fury in elections, defected in droves, according to exit polls.

In a major upset that will not be welcomed by the crisis-plagued country's eurozone partners, the two forces that had agreed to enact unpopular belt-tightening in return for rescue funds appeared headed for a beating, with none being able to form a government.

After nearly 40 years of dominating the Greek political scene, the centre-right New Democracy and socialist Pasok saw support drop dramatically in favour of parties that had virulently opposed the tough austerity dictated by international creditors.

9.15pm: Martine Aubrey - who could now become the Prime Minister of France, is on France 2. "Tonight my happiness is complete," she said. "I have asked for nothing in return for what I have done."

9.52pm CEST: For the French speakers among you, here is a selection of Hollande's speech in tweets, tweeted form his account as he was speaking. Clearly he was taping on his phone at the same time as giving a victory speech. It's that kind of talent that you need to be president of the Republic.

9.59pm CEST: Expansive victory speech from François Hollande. He saluted Nicolas Sarkozy, who he said "merited respect". Noting that there were many in the crowd "who had waited for this moment for a long time", he also noted that there were many young supporters who had never known a Socialist president.

"I am proud to be capable of giving hope again," he told cheering crowds. Thanking those who had supported him, he also reached out to those that hadn't. "I will be the president of all [...] There is only one France, one nation, reunited for the same destiny."

"Everyone in France with be treated equally, no child of the Republic will be sidelined, abandoned or discriminated against," he said. "The first thing the president of the Republic must do is to assemble and bring people together for the challenges we face."

France had to reduce its deficit, protect its social model and prioritise the environment and schools, he added. "I asked to be judged on two things: justice and youth."

But there were also some strong messages for Europe, for Angela Merkel in Germany in particular. Hollande, from the word go, indicated that France will have a different relationship with its closest and most important partner.

"Europe is watching us, when this result was announced I am sure that in some countries it was a relief, a hope," he said.

"Austerity is not inevitable," he added, adding that he would be speaking to France's "European partners" soon - by some reports as early as this evening.

There were also a few crowd-pleasing lines: "We are are not any old country, we are France," he declared. And as the speech came to a close, and an accordion player launched into La Vie En Rose, he said: "Life is beautiful this evening."

10.24pm CEST: Its going to be a hell of a party for Socialist supporters tonight. Kim Willsher has sent this from Solferino.

Jubilent crowds outside. One French Moroccan woman told me: "Now I can breathe again. Tomorrow I wake up a new woman, filled with hope."

A young man in expensive casual has just run through the edge of the crowd shouting Sarko for president. Not sure if he's joking. Thankfully everyone is happy and good humoured.

10.31pm CEST: In London, too, French Socialists are celebrating the demise of Sarkozy and the crowning of Hollande, according to Lizzy Davies.

At a party organized by the UK branch of the Parti Socialiste (PS), hundreds of Hollande supporters packed into a wine bar in the shadow of Southwark Cathedral and erupted into triumphant whooping once the projected results were announced. "Francois, président," they chanted. "Tous ensemble, tous ensemble Socialistes!" ("All together, all together Socialists!")

As the wine flowed and joyful toasts were made to "the left" and to the "change" which Hollande has promised, some of London's large expatriate community reflected on the fall of Sarkozy. Roses- the historic symbol of the PS- were scattered over tables.

"Living abroad, the way people look at your country is important. It's important for us to be proud of how France is seen in the world," said Hélène Seguin, an architect. For the previous five years, she explained, that had been hard- but now, she hoped, Hollande would restore some of France's lost dignity. "At least he's fighting for values which are close to what I believe," she said. Sarkozy's time in office, she added, had been "shameful".

Her colleague Myrtille Ferté, snacking on baguette and sipping a bottle of Kronenbourg, said: "Sarkozy's out, and now we have better prospects for France and for Europe…We will have to see what he is going to do. We're not deluded. We have to keep behind him and make sure he delivers on what he promised."

10.37pm: Le Monde have a handy breakdown of all the results, department by department. Current estimations have the result at 51.7% for Hollande, 48.3% for Sarkozy.

If, as she has promised, the 46-year-old journalist keeps her contract for the magazine Paris Match and continues to work, it would be the first time a president's partner has held down a regular job and salary. Her role as a journalist would make this juggling act even more tricky. For 20 years, she covered French politics for Paris Match, and also recently hosted her own politics show on cable. During the early days of the campaign, she reconverted to the culture beat, arguing there was no conflict of interest with the arts world, although she was furious when Paris Match put her on its cover under the headline "Hollande's charming asset".

Trierweiler, a twice-divorced mother of three teenage boys who comes from a modest family in eastern France, said during the campaign she had to keep working to support her children, saying she doesn't want to be paid for by the state.

From the town of Tulle in his rural heartland of Corrèze in southwest France, Hollande declared victory. "May 6 should be a great date for our country, a new start for Europe, a new hope for the world," he said. "I'm sure in a lot of European countries there is relief, hope that at last austerity is no longer inevitable."

He said his mission was to go to European leaders to demand measures for "growth, jobs and prosperity". Hollande's first move as president will be to push Germany to renegotiate Europe's budget discipline pact to include a clause on growth.

Hollande said France had voted for "change", but he had a "heavy" responsibility to drag the country out of economic crisis. Vowing that France would no longer be fractured, divided or riven by discrimination, or those in the poor high-rise suburbs and abandoned rural areas cast aside, he said: "No child of the republic will be abandoned."

11.07pm CEST: Hollande is currently winging his way to the Place de Bastille in Paris. But who what makes the new president tick, and how did Hollande - described as the "Captain of a pedalo in a storm" by left-wing firebrand Jean-Luc Mélenchon - get to this point? This excellent profile, again by the prolific Angelique Chrisafis tells you everything you need to know. Read the whole profile here, some extracts below.

The former Socialist party leader, he is a jovial, wise-cracking believer in consensus politics, who aides say never loses his rag and who so hates fights that he was once nicknamed "the marshmallow" within his own party, or "Flanby", after a wobbly caramel pudding. When, at the start of the year, Hollande still zipped around Paris on his sensible, three-wheeler scooter, one MP in his party warned he looked "more like a pizza delivery man" than the next president.

[...]

Asked about fears that he was too bland to be president, Hollande said: "Everyone says François Mitterrand had huge charisma. But before he was president they used to call him badly dressed, old, archaic and say he knew nothing about the economy … until the day he was elected. It's called universal suffrage. When you're elected, you become the person that embodies France. That changes everything."

Hollande's rise has been tortoise-like, and to his opponents, unexpected. For more than 30 years, he has held some of the most thankless jobs in French leftwing politics. For more than a decade, he was leader of the fractious Socialist party, where he once reportedly likened the constant task of calming of ego spats and political rows to clearing up dog turds.

For years, he fought an uphill battle to establish a provincial base in the enemy territory of Corrèze in south-west France, then the rural fiefdom of rightwing Jacques Chirac. After a marathon of hand-shaking at village markets and local politicking, Hollande was elected MP in Corrèze, then mayor of Tulle, a rural town famous for accordions and arms-making, and finally leader of Corrèze's general council, inheriting the poisoned chalice of the most indebted department in France. He would regularly make the 600mile round trip from his Paris home by car.

Leather briefcase in hand and portly frame bursting out of ill-fitting suits, he smoothed cracks behind the scenes in a party so volatile he was once nicknamed "Meccano-builder" for all the bridges he mended. In 2007, he watched the mother of his four children, Ségolène Royal, run for the presidency in his place while their relationship broke down in what one member of his party called a "Shakespearian drama".

Only three years ago, Hollande was in the political wilderness. He had quit the party leadership and was seen as such a rank outsider that his name barely featured in the polls.

Then last May, the then head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, seen as obvious Socialist presidential candidate, was arrested in New York over an alleged attempted rape of a hotel maid and saw his political hopes collapse.

Hollande had already begun a campaign to run as an "ordinary guy" against Strauss-Kahn. He had astounded friends by losing 12kg (26lb) in the most famous crash diet in French politics and invested in his first made-to-measure suits.

With Strauss-Kahn out of the contest, Hollande won the Socialist primary race. His supporters argued that as a moderate from the centre ground of the Socialist party, he was the only one who could beat Sarkozy. He promised to tackle the inequalities in society, give some hope back to youths battered by failing schools and high unemployment, and raise taxes on the rich.

The leader of an extreme-right, anti-immigrant party on course for shock success in Greece's general elections has lashed out at those he described as "traitors" responsible for the country's financial crisis and said his party was ushering in a "revolution."

The far-right Golden Dawn party is set to win 7% of the parliamentary vote, according to early projections, as Greeks punished the traditionally dominant parties who backed harsh austerity measures tied to debt-relief agreements.

Parties must exceed a 3% threshold of the vote to be represented in Greece's parliament. In the last general election in 2009, Golden Dawn only received 0.29%. It has seen its support jump as a wave of anti-immigrant sentiment has spread in financially devastated Greece.

Golden Dawn leader Nikolaos Michaloliakos said his party had delivered a blow against the country's corrupt leadership.

[...]

Golden Dawn campaigned hard against illegal immigration, and its supporters have been blamed for a recent spike in inner-city street attacks against mostly Asian immigrants.

The party's supporters, routinely seen intimidating immigrants in run-down parts of the capital, wear black shirts, and its emblems resemble Nazi insignia. But Michaloliakos has rejected the neo-Nazi label widely used for his party, stressing that it is staunchly nationalist.

Referring to immigrants, Golden Dawn's campaign slogan in television ads was "let's rid this country of the stench".

[...]

Flanked by two muscly aides, Michaloliakos later told a news conference: "Those who betray this country – it's time for them to be afraid. We are coming."

He did not elaborate, but added: "We will fight to free Greece from the global loan sharks, for a Greece of dignity and independence, and for a Greece that is not a social jungle with all these millions of illegal immigrants that were brought here."

This is what Golden Dawn looks like - the Greek party that will get almost a tenth of the seats in parliament. twitter.com/johanknorberg/…

11.39pm CEST: Back to France. We've got a super whizz-bang interactive map of results of the French election coming up. But until that moment, the amazing King of Data Simon Rogers has put this Google Doc together.

11.42pm CEST: Not enough info for you? Simon has already created this interactive map of the Greek election results.

11.50pm CEST: The celebrations continue in France. Angelique Chrisafis is among the revellers:

From marginalised pariah, the far-right group's popularity has soared in the midst of the economic crisis. Polls show the extremists poised to gain about 5% of the vote – enough to secure a dozen or more seats in the 300-member house for the first time since the collapse of the rabidly rightwing regime of the Colonels in 1974.

At 50 Deleyiannis, Chrysi Avgi's party headquarters, the walls hold framed pictures of men carrying giant red flags. The logo on the flags, like those on Chyrsi Avgi caps, T-shirts and vests, resembles the swastika. Books on display in the party's first-floor bookstore are thinly veiled diatribes on the power of racial supremacy with titles such as White Power. Neo-Nazi symbols are rife. The cover of yet another tome shows the lead singer of a local heavy metal band delivering a fascist salute.

Nikolaos Michaloliakos, the man who formed the party in 1994, openly backed Greece's military dictatorship, but firmly denies that Chrysi Avgi is full of unreconstructed fascists. Instead, he says, the group is more of an anti-immigration platform, the home of "patriots who want to return Greece to the Greeks". The 235 candidates that the party will field include farmers, shepherds, workers and retired army officers.

"They are simple people who do not come from the antechambers of foreign embassies," says Michaloliakos, who was vaulted into the national consciousness when he won a seat on Athens city council in 2010 and addressed its first session with a Nazi salute. "Nor do they come from the filthy political circles which are to blame for the wretchedness of our homeland!"

12.18am CEST: Et voila - François Hollande, the new president of France, arrives to the cheers of his supporters at the Place de Bastille in Paris.

12.23am CEST: Left-wing daily Liberation ALWAYS has the best headlines. This one for tomorrow is a classic.

12.35am CEST: Last dispatch on the situation in Greece for the evening from the live blog. Fiachra Gibbons, an expert on the country currently living in Paris who we heard from before, has sent this on the rise of the far-Right and its history in Greece.

Over the years I have watched the rise of Chrisi Avgi (Golden Dawn), particularly in Athens, where their vigilantes have been "reclaiming the streets for Greeks" who they say are now in a minority in the centre of their capital city because of the large number of legal immigrants who have been effectively marooned in Greece over the last 15 year, unable to reach their hoped-for destinations of Italy, Germany or Britain.

Make no mistake, they are true neo-fascists and if given half the chance, have no compunction about using violence. They are rumoured to have made in-roads into the police and I have come across border guards on the Albaniam and Macedonian borders who made little secret of their affiliations to the party.

Their result tonight is shocking, deeply shocking, but they have not come from nowhere. Greece has always had an often quite wide far-right fringe, that takes in royalist nostalgics and those that hanker after the nationalist certainties of colonels, whose dictatorship fell in 1974.

Chrisi Avgi have taken the vote of the existing far-right religious party Laos, the Popular Orthodox Rally, which polled more than seven percent in the Euro elections in 2009, but whose vote collapsed almost completely in this election.

Greece has a very real illegal immigration problem. Three or four hundred people a day enter the country illegally. But again Chrisi Avgi's cause has been helped by more mainstream parties of the right, particularly by Antonis Samaras, the leader of the largest party, Nea Demokratika, who took a leaf out of Sarkozy's book, and sang from Chrisi Avgi's hymn sheet, claiming there was an "unarmed invasion" of the country by illegal immigrants. He accused anti-racist campaigners of "ideological terrorism" and said "Greece has become a warehouse for all the undesirables." He said there was "no homeland without patriotism" and "Greece is a country, not just an area, and Greeks are a people not just a population", implying immigrants could not be integrated into Greek society.

12.41am CEST: Hollande took to the stage in the Place de Bastille, happy to enjoy the cheers of his supporters.

With a cracked voice, he addressed the crowd who had waited for hours for him to arrive.

"I don't know if you can hear me, but I have heard you. I heard your willingness to change. Your force, your hope ... and I want to tell you how grateful I am", he said. "Thank you, thank you, thank you people of France."

Hollande promised to repair the "ruptures" in French society and reunite the country.

"We are living in a significant, a momentous, moment," he told supporters. They had achieved no ordinary victory, he said, but "a beautiful , great victory which raises up our country and makes it happy".

He exhorted supporters to remember the moment for the rest of their years and again reiterated his intention of questioning the austerity measures in Europe. Socialist supporters were part of a wider movement that was spreading in Europe, he added.

"Be happy, be proud, be generous, be respectful, be proud to be French citizens," he cried to cheers.

As the speech came to a close, there was no La Vie en Rose this time, but La Marseillaise, with Holande singing every word.

That's it for the liveblog this evening, but join us again tomorrow for analysis of today's result and what it means for the rest of Europe.